September 8, 2010

The evolutionary psychologists are at it again. In this mode of thinking, as you should expect, a man is perceived as attractive when in fact he's got good "reproductive potential." So dance like you could impregnate a woman with a healthy baby and she'll think you're a good dancer. The scientists have provided an animation to demonstrate the technique — ironically using a genitalia-free computer figure.

ADDED: An emailer said that reminds him of this — which I think is adorable (but don't say "retarded," because that's wrong... plus: it isn't. It's awesome.)

Women are attraced to men's shoes which directly show his class and status. Dancing doesn't protect women and children as even women can see. Women are attracted to what does protect them and their children...and that is the man's status within the tribe as shown by his shoe style and condition. Of course wearing shorts negates the best shoes in show.

Even as I clicked on the link I was thinking "The Onion", but when I saw the BBC marker flash up, I have to admit my ire was raised a notch.

Who the hell 1) funds this shit and 2) would bother studying it?

I mean, sure, it's probably more useful than cocaine effects in monkeys, but still. And it really not a mystery. For guys, dancing well will get you laid more than not.

On second thought, I take back point 2. I could easily be convinced into studying the dancing versus getting laid thing. Just getting a woman to voluntarily give out that info is half a green light in and of itself. Evolutionary psychologists get all the chicks, you know.

Dancing well is a social need for women over 50, and men who learn dancing from a teacher will never go without a female companion. In Atlanta there is a surplus of great dance instructors from Russia, of all places, and they are task masters with their pupils.

Showing that the phrase "Whether you're a brother or whether you're a mother, you're stayin alive, stayin alive" is actually a deep and complex principal of biological evolution and not just some fluffy pop jingle.

This report is 100% of true. But being uninhibited and agile on the dance floor, thus in bed too, does not necessarily translate to virile man juices.

<anecdote alert>My brother and I went out together clubbing. Observing the dance floor from the bar I remarked to my brother that a lousy dancer is most likely lousy in bed too. Conversely, a good dancer is most likely good in the sack, and this is true of both men and women. My brother goes.

OH, BULLSHIT !

Apparently, he was a self-conscious dancer.

Following that episode he took dance lessons. Turns out, he was quite good. Met a lot of birds through that. He told me due to his mad skillz the instructor paired him with the more difficult cases. This was traditional dance steps, not the free-form movements one does at the clubs. Nevertheless, he learned how to move and gained much confidence in expressing through his body. Then he got married. Then his wife had their first child. FACT! And that proves at least so far he is an adequate impregnator.<anecdote alert>

When you try to explain how the Intelligent Design is just doing pseudoscience stuff like this comes up to show just how weak a science evolutionary biology is. In engineering when some huckster comes along with a line of bull you can run tests, do calculations, examine precise mathematical predictions of established theory. By comparison, evolutionary biology is just a plausible story. Yes it fits a lot of data - and that distinguishes it from attempts at science like, say, Freudian psychology - which has failed basically every test that has been applied to it. But there is no "rigorous" way to extend evolution. (The use of the word "rigorous" by this group makes this mathematician sick to his stomach.)

Amen, Hoosier Daddy. You can also try plastering your (good) credit report to the front of your T-shirt and the HIV-free certificate on the back. With standards so minimal maybe it still is a man's world.

There aren't any such dance moves. What made John Travolta's passing the V sign across his eyes sexy in "Pulp Fiction?" It's not about the dancing, it's about the overall impression that you're self-assured, masterful and know what you're doing.

I'm not about to defend evolutionary psychology--maybe there is a way to understand human universals with it, but all the articels I ever see about it in the press seem way too ethnocentric.

That being said, evolutionary psychology, even if it is as silly as journalists make it out to be, does not discredit evolution by natural selection anymore than Deepak Chopra discredits quantum mechanics.

And even if evolutionary psychology is complete nonsense, this cannot make intelligent design or creationism a viable scientific alternative anymore than homeopathy can be.

Did any of these scientists go down to Carnival in Trinidad and Tobago? Did they see the men gyrating and bumping and grinding as though their waists had snake juice? Do these scientists know that all a woman thinks is she'd like to ride that horse and see if he's as good horizontally as he is vertically? What morons these scientists be.

Should be "that make men attractive to women who are attracted to men who dance well."

I'd say very few men actually dance well. And a good many men find women. The key is to do something well and you will find a woman who is probably attracted to men who do that particular thing well, or at the very least are attracted to men who do something well.

Far too many men try to attract women by doing something the "experts" say the women want, when the men don't even really want the women that want that sort of thing. Thus, there is divorce when the men and the women find they don't actually like each other but have been playing a game for far too long.

All I know is that Serbian Janko Tipsarevic, in shorts, reeked of testosterone - over the TV - as he took out Andy Roddick in the US Open last week. I'm not a big tennis fan, but I guess that is a form of dancing.

I thought a couple of years ago we established that women wanted husbands who were nice and hardworking, but wanted the wild man to father our children.

What this post reminds me of is Tom Cruise (as Les Grossman) dancing in Tropic Thunder. Despite all the ways in which TC repels me, to me he's eternally redeemed himself for playing that character, doing that dance.